School groups seek new education solutions for Fairhope

FAIRHOPE, Alabama -- Opponents of an effort to create a Fairhope city school system expressed relief last week that the primary group that had been pushing for a vote on the issue had laid aside that effort indefinitely.

Many also expressed support for one of the new stated goals of Fairhope Schools Good2Great: to have the City Council set aside some tax revenue to subsidize local schools.

“We can probably come back together now on issues that we agree on. That may be one of them,” said Miranda Schrubbe, a Fairhope resident who is an active member of the Baldwin County Education Coalition and the Fairhope Educational Enrichment Foundation.

“I know friends who haven’t been speaking to one another over the school split. It’s been very divisive,” Schrubbe said.

The leaders of Fairhope Schools Good2Great announced early last week that they would abandon their push for a referendum late this year to create a city school system. The decision was made in response to a poll conducted early this month for the group that showed city residents were lukewarm at best on a school split.

Diana Brewer, who took a leave of absence this summer from her position as executive director of FEEF to help with Good2Great’s referendum push, said Friday that the group is not “packing up and going home.” In fact, laying aside the school split issue has given the group new energy, she said.

“It’s clearer than ever that in Fairhope we have different aspirations for our schools than people in the rest of the county. Good2Great’s goal has always been to improve education for the children of Fairhope,” Brewer said. “Our goal has not changed. How we will go about achieving that goal is changing.”

In the poll, 66 percent of respondents said they believed that the city’s schools should reflect “the Fairhope way.” The poll did not define exactly what that meant, but Brewer said Friday that it means “striving for excellence in everything.”

Good2Great members said last week they will now take a few months to formulate a new multi-pronged approach to improving schools in Fairhope, then present it to the public.

A major goal likely will be getting the City Council to allocate tax money for schools, creating a “line item” for education in the city’s budget. The money could be spent on any number of things, from technology upgrades to hiring teacher assistants.

Bob Riggs, who moved to Fairhope with his wife 11 years ago after retiring from a long career as a college administrator, was a vocal opponent of the proposed school split. Riggs said last week that he supports using city funds to supplement education.

“I think that’s definitely something we should do,” Riggs said. He said he has no family in the Fairhope area and has no personal stake in the debate except that, as a homeowner and resident, he would likely have to pay higher taxes if a school split occurred.

“I was off sailing with my wife for the first several weeks this Good2Great thing came about,” said Riggs, a former president of Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, Tenn. “When I came back and saw the stories, I became incensed.”

Council President Lonnie Mixon said Friday that any decision about giving money to Fairhope schools will first require “a lot of discussion.” Among his concerns, he said, is that the city already gives money to FEEF and to the county’s “Yes We Can” campaign.

“I think we should all try to go in the same direction and not get fragmented,” Mixon said.

Baldwin County Public Schools Superintendent Alan Lee said last week that he looks forward to seeing what Good2Great does in the near future, and to working with them to improve Fairhope schools.

“Fairhope parents have the rightful expectation that we should make what is already good even better,” Lee said. “We have a commitment to making those schools better.”

Lee said he was interested to see one particular result of the poll that led Good2Great to set aside its referendum campaign.

Of the 301 Fairhope voters polled in early July, 81 percent of respondents said they believed that Baldwin County has one of Alabama’s best school systems.

“I can’t express enough my appreciation for the confidence in our schools that people showed in that poll,” Lee said.

The poll was conducted by Larry Powell, an associate professor of communications at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He said the poll suggests that most residents “are quite satisfied with the status quo.”